A judge ruled Thursday that prosecutors have enough evidence to proceed to trial in the case of a Boulder police officer accused of planning to murder his ex-girlfriend's new boyfriend.

Five-year Boulder police veteran Christian McCracken, 32, of Frederick, is charged with attempted first-degree murder and felony stalking after police say he stalked his ex-girlfriend, a Boulder police dispatcher, and planned to kill her new boyfriend.

At a preliminary hearing Thursday, Detective Sgt. Tom Trujillo testified how McCracken told his roommate, a fellow Boulder officer, about going by his former girlfriend's Broomfield apartment April 26 and seeing her being intimate with a male Boulder dispatcher.

McCracken told his roommate he wanted to kill the new boyfriend but said, "I would never do that," Trujillo said.

The roommate later found McCracken had gone to the Boulder police station and picked up his service pistol, Trujillo said. The roommate asked McCracken to give him the gun, which he did, along with ammunition, Trujillo said.

McCracken told his roommate that his plan was to come up behind the man and shoot him in the head while his ex-girlfriend watched, then go into the mountains and kill himself, Trujillo testified.

The roommate drove McCracken to Exempla Good Samaritan Medical Center in Lafayette, where he voluntarily checked in for a mental health evaluation.

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Defense attorney Chris Griffin noted that McCracken had an assault rifle he kept at a separate residence that he could have much more easily obtained if he wanted to kill the new boyfriend. He contended that simply picking up a gun from a police station did not mean McCracken had "taken a significant step" toward murdering the man.

Boulder County Judge Norma Sierra ruled there's enough evidence for the case to proceed to an arraignment hearing, scheduled for Aug. 3.

McCracken had been on leave from the police department since August, when he suffered a serious head injury while attempting to arrest a suspect outside of The Sink on University Hill.

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